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Pirate trolling and WWDC scholarships: The Week in Downloads

Every week, we compile the best new reviews, products, and features from the Download.com software catalog and blog, package them up in a tidy little newsletter, and e-mail it out to all of our lovely subscribers.

If you are a registered CNET member, you can sign up for the newsletter yourself (it's listed as "CNET Download.com Software Dispatch" under "Software News and Reviews"), or check back every Tuesday to read our latest roundup.

Top Download News and Features

Microsoft launches a public beta for its new Facebook app for Windows Phone 8 Game … Read more

Facebook courts small businesses with new ad type

Facebook is providing Page owners with a basic way to pay to garner more "likes."

Promoted Page Likes is a new ad tool attached to Pages and is meant to more conveniently serve small businesses that don't have the targeting requirements, or budgets, of bigger companies. Tuesday marks the global rollout of the tool, first introduced in the U.S. in December, a Facebook spokesperson told CNET.

Page owners can make the simplified ad buys from the admin section of their Pages and choose between showing their ads to people nearby, or in the same city, state, … Read more

Facebook beta testers wanted

Everyone has their two cents about new software releases, but this time your unsolicited advice is, well, being solicited. Today Microsoft has invited Windows Phone 8 users who also happen to be Facebook fans to test out its official Facebook beta for Windows Phone 8--prior to its release. The existing app can remain on your phone alongside the beta version.

The redesigned 7MB app now includes requested features such as support for high-resolution photos, post sharing, and Facebook Timeline, and it also moves away from the "Metro" style interface of the standard Facebook app for Windows Phone 7 and 8, … Read more

Microsoft wants beta testers for new Win Phone Facebook app

Microsoft is seeking beta testers for a refreshed version of the official Facebook app for Windows Phone, which was developed by Microsoft in conjunction with Facebook.

Microsoft officials blogged on April 30 that the company is seeking testers for the refreshed Facebook app for Windows Phone 8. The beta isn't available via the Windows Store (to avoid confusion, according to the Softies). Instead, the beta is available via this link.

The refreshed Facebook app is "undergoing a major redesign," according to the blog post, and will include several "much-requested" features, including support for high-res photos, … Read more

Facebook earnings: Skepticism on all fronts

Like a growing number of teens, Wall Street is emphatically meh on Facebook.

Though the social network is expected to show marked improvement on mobile and 43 percent year-over-year growth in advertising revenue, investor confidence remains low. Facebook shares, stagnant since the company's last report, suggest that the market trusts the long-term health of the social-networking service the way a parent relies on the word of an adolescent child.

As far as numbers go, Wall Street expects Facebook to report $1.44 billion in revenue and adjusted earnings per share of $0.13 when it details its first-quarter financial … Read more

Budweiser's intimate, dangerous way to make Facebook friends

So you've had a couple of beers.

You meet a nice person of your target sex. Well, they seem nice, given that you've had a couple of beers.

At some point, one of you raises your beer cup to clink cups with the other.

The minute the cups clink, you are indelibly linked. At least you are if you're using Budweiser's special Facebook-friending cups.… Read more

Homebase - Facebook Home Theme 1.6 Review

If you're bummed out that your phone can't use Facebook Home, this app promises to help. Homebase - Facebook Home Theme claims to give you the lock screen and features you'll see on Facebook Home. Sadly, what it actually delivers is a buggy lock screen that doesn't even lock your phone -- or mimic Facebook Home.

Though this app claims to be a Facebook Home Theme lock screen, it doesn't seem to be. In fact, it doesn't seem to be a lock screen at all. Instead of locking your phone, Homebase shows up after … Read more

Facebook schedules annual shareholder meeting for June 11

Facebook announced Friday that it will hold its first annual shareholder meeting on June 11 at the Westin San Francisco Airport hotel.

The company's stock, which closed at $26.85 per share today, has seen brighter days, though not many since its bungled initial public offering. As such, we should anticipate heated discussions around the social network's underperforming shares and pressure on CEO Mark Zuckerberg to turn things around. Oh, to be a fly on those walls.

Facebook's official agenda is less exciting. The company will hold a vote to re-elect its eight board directors, not including … Read more

Longtime Facebook board member Jim Breyer stepping down

Jim Breyer, the venture capitalist whose firm Accel Partners made an early bet on Facebook, is stepping down from Facebook's board, according to a Securities and Exchange Commission filing on Friday.

Bryer courted co-founder Mark Zuckerberg in Facebook's early days and eventually got him to agree to take a $12.7 million investment that valued the company at $93 million. What a bet that turned out to be -- for Breyer and his firm. Accel sold $2.1 billion worth of shares into Facebook's IPO last May. Last October, Breyer personally cashed in more than $81.1 million … Read more